My Book Blog 10: Keep Learning

In my last blog, I want to talk about professional development. I still remember how relieved I felt about finishing graduate school and starting to be a teacher four years ago. After many years of schooling both in my home country and in the U.S, I was exhausted  and ready to say goodbye to being a student. But today I have made the decision to come back to further my education because during my past four years of teaching, there has not been one day when I do not feel the need to keep my knowledge of content and knowledge of education current; there has not been one day when I feel totally contented with my teaching skills.

Routman argues in her book that there is no shortcut to studying about our profession and reflecting on our practice. We must make time for ongoing professional development. Otherwise, we will remain at the mercy of outsiders to make decisions for us. Knowledge gives us power and energy. With knowledge, "we are able to be decisive, we have fresh ideas, we can figure out what makes sense, we know how to teach our students and move them forward." (Routman, 212) Not only that, our own enthusiasm for learning can also increase student passion for learning and achievement. Personally, since I decided to pursue my Ph.D. degree, I have been able to have more empathy for my students and I have felt more energetic about my teaching.

There are many types of professional development and Routman suggests two relatively easy and inexpensive ways to conduct professional development. Her first suggestion is to take part in schoolwide conversations. She says school that are more collegial and collaborative are happier places and have higher student achievement. The most effective teachers are the ones who read about their profession, collaborate with their colleagues, and actively engage in ongoing professional conversations. Through my own experience, I have also realized that sharing and exchanging ideas with my colleagues is one of the best ways to improve my own teaching. Unfortunately, we do not have many opportunities for this kind of professional conversation.

Routman's second suggestion is to make time for personal and professional reading. Exemplary teachers always read a lot because it is how they enrich their lives and continue to grow as a teacher and a learner. How do we find the extra time for such reading? Routman then cites her favorite quote on the subject to explain. I am copying part of the quote here because it makes very good sense:

"If you have to ask yourself where you'll find the time, it means the desire isn't there…Life is a perpetual plot to keep us from reading…Time spent reading is always time stolen…stolen from what? From life's obligations…Time spent reading, like time spent loving, increase our lifetime…reading does not belong to the societal organization of time. Like love, it is a way of being…"

We teachers need to do whatever we can to ensure that our students love learning.  In order to cultivate a love of learning, we ourselves, first and foremost, need to have that love of learning. To me, I see being able to participate in professional development as one of the best parts of our job.

My Book Blog 9: A Critical Issue in Teaching--Pacing

             Have you ever been in a class or a meeting that seemed to drag on forever? Or, one that seemed to pass in a flash? As a teacher, I would want my students to feel that my class seems to pass in a flash because they are so engaged in the lesson that they forget about time. Here we are talking about the issue of pacing, which is simply the speed at which we move through a lesson. In chapter 12, Routman makes a special note about the importance of keeping a lively pace in the classroom.

  

           Pacing is a way to keep students engaged in learning. Routman cites recent brain research results that indicate we have students' attention for less than ten minutes before they need a "cognitive rest" (206). This result means that we must allow lots of time for students to process and digest new information. When the work is interesting and we move along at a fast pace, we keep students engaged. A good-paced lesson appears to unfold more quickly and helps students to feel that they are moving along.

            How to create that lively pace? Routman says that she is always looking at her watch when teaching. She times every activity, keeps it to a short period, makes her teaching points, and moves on. She argues that when we try to "stuff" our lessons by trying to do everything, we lose students' attention and we tire them out. What a good teacher will do is focus on one or two important teaching points, and do them well. 

   

Another way to create the illusion of speed is to use a variety of activities to accomplish a single lesson objective and to create structures that maximize participation. When we change the type of work or activity, the method of presentation , or the way students are grouped together, we are changing the pace. When we create structures that promote maximum participation, such as student-led groups, discussion groups,  shared reading or partner reading, students tend to be more engaged and they learn more.              At our community college, a typical class lasts one hour and fifty minutes, so it is critical for teachers to use good pacing in order to engage students throughout the entire class period. My understanding about pacing is that it does not mean you present material at a fast speed, but rather students feel that you are moving quickly and students like to think they are going through a lesson quickly.              One challenge I have faced with keeping a brisk pace in my teaching is classroom management. This summer semester I have a rowdy group of students in one of my college success skills classes. It has been very difficult to move smoothly from one activity to another because I always have to stop and control the students before starting again. You would assume that these are adult students and they should have known how to behave in a classroom. But boy, I was wrong! To keep a lively pace in the classroom, the organization and management of students is just as important as the organization of instructional materials.

My Book Blog 8: Live an Interesting Life

              I was recently on an interview committee for full-time reading faculty positions at our school. Our very last interview question is: how do you want to improve yourself as a teacher? Our candidates gave various answers, some of which I did not find very meaningful. I have been pondering on that question since the interview and I was happy to find a couple of good answers in Routman's book.

            Chapter 12 of the book is titled "You Only Have So Much Time" and in this chapter, Routman gives some good tips on how to make our teaching lives easier and more productive. Her first suggestion is to live an interesting life. Do you often feel tired from work? Do you feel you never have enough time to do it all? Our time is limited and valuable. We have to spend it in the most meaningful, productive ways possible. Routman told the story of a teacher who was going to decline an invitation to an evening out because she had papers to grade. Routman advised her to go to the event and be an interesting person because you cannot come to work each day enthusiastic about teaching if all you did the night before was grade papers. We all want to and need to "have a life." As teachers, we are not only role models for learning; we are also role models for living. Staying late after school does not necessarily make someone a more effective teacher. Our students will not become better readers because we give them lots of paperwork and grade lots of papers. They will become better readers if they receive excellent instruction from us. Living an interesting life keeps us energetic and enthusiastic about teaching and therefore, we will be able to provide better instruction to our students.

            Routman's second suggestion is to spend most of your time thinking. Routman says that she spends a lot of time planning for her instruction, but it is mostly thinking and this thinking goes on all the time. She specifically mentions four questions that she has in mind all the time:

1. What do I want them to know and understand?

2. How can I help them know and understand it?

3. How will I know when they know and understand it?

4. What are my new expectations for students?

These four questions form a complete circle of learning starting with goals and expectations, going onto teaching strategies and learning activities, finishing up with assessment and evaluations. Then the circle starts again with new learning. To me, this kind of thinking and reflection is key to becoming a good teacher. Constantly doing this kind of thinking and reflection is how we can improve as a teacher. I also remember a conversation with a very experienced teacher. She says teaching never stops at the end of the school day or when you step outside of your classroom.

            So now if I am asked "how do you want to improve as a teacher", I would say first of all, I want to live an interesting life and then, I want to be constantly thinking and reflecting about my daily teaching practices.

My Book Blog 7: Teach children, not programs.

           Dear fellow teachers, have you ever been forced to go along with programs and practices you know are not working well for many of your students because you have to meet rising demands of curriculum, standards and high-stakes testing? Have you ever felt so defeated and exhausted that you doubt you would have any power to change things? If so, Routman asks you to speak out and say NO (if you are tenured) because it is our professional obligation to be the advocate for our students and ensure that they receive excellent instruction. No one else knows our students as well as we do and if we as professionals continue to remain silent and passive, people outside education will continue to determine what we should do in our classrooms.

            In  Chapter 11, Routman cautions all teachers to be informed about relevant research and be selective about prescribed instructional programs. She strongly argues that "only you, as a knowledgeable teacher, can decide what your reading program should encompass and how it should be organized. There is no best program or perfect model of teaching reading" (186). I can really relate to what Routman is saying about not going with the flow, but going with your instincts as a teacher.

            If you are familiar with developmental education, you probably know that across the whole nation, developmental education has been under a microscope and scrutinized closely. Many people cannot justify why we have to spend our tax money educating students twice on the same content. As a result, we as developmental educators, have felt enormous pressure to prove what we are doing is highly necessary and to prove we are producing satisfying results. We examine all kinds of research on developmental education, and look at various new programs and models being invented across the country. To be honest, many times, my colleagues  and I have felt that we got to adapt that particular model because it has worked for a particular school and we got to try it out too. At other times, as Routman describes, we start to doubt that we can improve instruction without an expensive program. In fact, over the past few years, faculty and administrators at my school have been involved in time-consuming, and money-consuming programs with the intension to improve our teaching. However, these programs either work only for a while when the money and resource is there or end up in the planning stage because it is too difficult to implement. What we did not do enough, as Routman suggests, is to invest in the professional development of teachers.

            What Routman says has so much truth because without effective teachers, regardless of the approach, program, or materials being used, students are less likely to be successful. Routman goes on to say that she is by no means against using programs. She recommends using programs only as a resource and beginning framework. Learn from it, see how it works for your students, adapt it and change it. All in all, "exemplary teachers taught children, and typical teachers taught programs" (Routman, 185).

My Book Blog 6: Guided Reading

 Guided reading is small-group instruction for students who read the same text. In guided reading, the teacher provides support for small groups of readers as they learn to use various reading strategies in a manageable text. Guided Reading has been traditionally associated with younger readers in primary grades, but it can be modified and used successfully in all grade levels. For example, in my developmental reading classroom, my adult students may need to learn how to read an informational text rather than a story book and guided reading can provide them with the type of guiding and supporting they need.

Since I started reading my book, I have been constantly thinking about the differences between teaching children to read and teaching adults to read. Guided reading can be used with all age groups; the difference is that in lower grades children are learning to read and in upper grades students are reading to learn. One of the framing questions for LLSS 538 also deals with the differences between learning to read and reading to learn. Now I can better define my goal as a developmental reading teacher, which is teaching my students how to read to learn. I need to equip my students with the reading strategies to navigate college study materials and give them access to the information they are seeking.

How is guided reading different from independent reading and shared reading? A key part to guided reading is the teacher's guidance to the student, which includes teacher providing immediate feedback, correction, and instruction on specific skill development. In shared reading, the teacher leads the class in reading a text. Guided reading has many of the same components as shared reading. However, it is conducted with a smaller number of students and focuses more on the individual reading needs of each student. In independent reading, students read books on their own, exploring different kinds of texts and applying new learning without assistance.  It is not hard to understand that an effective reading program should include all the above three models.

One challenge with guided reading, according to Routman, is what the other students should be doing while you are teaching guided reading groups. I can see this challenge turn into a serious classroom management issue. Will the students not in a guided reading group be able to do what they are expected to do? Routman's advice is very simple: you establish your routine from day one and expect students to manage their own behavior. She says that in a class where teachers have bonded with students and have treated students respectfully, students will return that respect and they will understand how important it is for the teacher to teach freely and uninterrupted. Of course, you will always want to engage the rest of the students in other kinds of literacy activities, such as independent reading, literature circle, book clubs, etc.  I  am a little worried about whether some of my students will live up to this expectation because they tend to slack off when my attention is not focused on them.  It sounds bad, but I have to say that sometimes my adult students do not behave nearly as well as children, which has always been a challenge to my teaching.

Book Blog 5: Shared Reading

I teach developmental reading at Central New Mexico Community College. In my classroom,  my students age anywhere from 18 to 60 and their reading levels range from 5th grade to 10th grade. One difficulty in our teaching is the lack of research and training for how to teach adult readers. Most of the exiting research and professional development is more specifically geared toward teaching children as well as teenagers. The book I chose to read also focuses on teaching children. Some of the good ideas mentioned in the book are hard to implement in our classroom setting, such as establishing an excellent class library. I get more excited when I come to this shared reading chapter because the author particularly emphasizes that this strategy can be used for students of all ages.

What is shared reading? "In shared reading, a learner or group of learners sees the text, observes an expert (usually the teacher) reading it with fluency and expression, and is invited to read along" (Routman, 130). There are multiple benefits to shared reading. First, teacher can model and guide students in all aspects of reading to comprehend--fluency, figuring out words, thinking, questioning, predicting, and rereading. Second, it helps students and teachers bond in an enjoyable process. Third, it provides a context for students to talk with one another about a text, which improves comprehension.

Not only is shared reading a powerful teaching tool for students of all ages, but also is ideal for showing how any text works-fiction or nonfiction. In my classroom, 99% of the reading material is nonfiction, didactic, and "inconsiderate" text, which tends to be a little boring and difficult to read. I think the shared reading process will be able to engage my students more and make their reading tasks less stressful.

So how is a shared reading session conducted? Routman gives two very detailed lesson examples in the book. In each of the examples, she starts her shared reading session with surveying the text and activating students' prior knowledge. When reading the text out aloud, she stops constantly and voices out what is going on in her head regarding what she has just read. She makes her own thinking very explicit because she wants students to "see" her thinking. During the process, she also pauses to let students do "partner talks"--discussing, summarizing or retelling with a peer. Besides, she also constantly asks questions to check students understanding. Through the lesson examples, I can really tell that shared reading is a highly engaging way to involve students with long texts, especially when the text itself is highly informative and entertaining.

I know this is a powerful teaching tool that I can use with my adult readers. But what are my challenges? For a shared reading session to be successful, first of all, I need to be careful about not dominating the talk. Students' active participation is key to this strategy; so it will be hard to conduct the lesson  if the group is shy and quiet. Second, plan it! As the teacher, I need to be very familiar with the text, plan my questions to ask, my thinking aloud, and students peer activities. Routman recommends putting most of your planning comments on sticky notes right in the text, which I consider very helpful. Anyway, I am excited about learning this strategy and cannot wait to give it a try.

My Book Blog 4: Teach Comprehension

I read this section of my book while completing the "Two Student Readers-Jeremy and Rachel" assignment, and I was able to make connections between these two texts. In Jeremy and Rachel's case, they look and sound competent, read smoothly, and can retell what they have read, but they are unable to go further in their comprehension, for example, determine what is more important in a text. Therefore, they are only "superficial readers" according to Routman. Real and good readers are always aware of their understanding or lack of understanding and always do whatever is necessary to make sense of what they are reading.

In the book, Routman argues that comprehension is critical to reading and we need to teach comprehension right from the start, from the day kids enter preschool or kindergarten. The good news is that comprehension has become a focus in our teaching; the bad news is that the teaching of comprehension strategies is often isolated from exercises. Routman describes in the typical reading classroom nowadays, teachers often focus on practicing one comprehension strategy for weeks and then move on to teach the next comprehension strategy.

That is exactly how I teach in my developmental reading course. We have a required list of strategies to go over during a semester based on the course syllabus, and we tackle those strategies one by one hoping that our students will exit our course equipped with a toolkit of comprehension strategies to use in their college reading. However, the reality is that our students spend large amount of time learning and practicing these strategies, often without knowing how to apply them and how the strategies fit into their reading of college materials. The problem, according to Routman, lies in not enough time for independent reading that enables students to use and practice these strategies.

The book then goes on to recommend the 20%-to-80% rule, which means 20% of class time allocated for explicit instruction of strategies and 80% of class time dedicated to the act of reading.

In my own teaching practice, I do leave the majority of class period for students reading practice. But a frustrating problem I have constantly experienced is that students go ahead to read with their old reading habits in spite of all the instruction on the useful strategies that were taught to them 10 minutes ago. For example, after I teach highlighting, some of the students are still reading with their hands in their pocket and their text as clean as new. Another frustrating problem with a lot of my students is that they rarely reread materials for better comprehension, even though rereading is the single most useful comprehension strategies as Routman describes it. They read through the material and then rush to do the comprehension questions. When they stumble on one question, they generally do not go back to reread the text; instead, they just go with their memory of the text or instincts. I have simply blamed some of my students for their laziness, but I am aware that as the teacher, I need to address the problems, but I have been  and am still looking for the solution…

My Book Blog 3: Independent Reading

" A carefully monitored independent reading program is the single most important part of your reading instructional program." (Routman, 87)

Many teachers and administrators assume that the way to improve students' reading proficiency is by doing lots of comprehension instruction and whole-class and small-group work. However, the reality has been less-successful-than-expected results. What is the problem here? Routman's suggestion is to add more independent reading. According to Routman, independent reading means that students get to read a book of their choice during an allotted block of time on a daily basis with teacher carefully monitoring the process. The reading is then followed by a teacher-student conference during which teacher assesses student's reading progress and new reading goals are set.

Why is independent reading so important? First of all, large amount of research has shown that students who read more, read better and have higher reading achievement. Independent reading  provides students with the opportunity to do massive amount of real reading. Second, independent reading is fun because students can choose to read something they are interested in. What is ironic is that when teachers are pressed for time, independent reading is usually the first thing to be cut.

As I was reading this section of my book, I could not help thinking about how much independent reading my students get to do in my class. The answer? None. In fact, the idea of independent reading has never occurred to me when I try to improve my students' reading proficiency by a few grade levels during a period of 15 weeks. Just a few days ago, during a conversation with a reading teacher from another college, she asked what novels we read and I laughed at her question because we never had the time to read a novel. What do we do in our reading classroom? It is a lot of comprehension instruction, drill practice, and projects. The reason why our reading program is structured this way is that we are here to prepare our students to read expository college textbooks and other related course materials. With that as our mission, independent reading seems to have no place in our curriculum. However, Routman has cited a longstanding, highly respected body of research to show the value to free-choice voluntary reading in classrooms. I really can see the value of independent reading and have been thinking about how to incorporate it into our developmental reading program.

One thing Routman mentioned that might fit into my teaching practice is computerized reading-incentive program. She says those programs seem to work because students are required to read for long blocks of time. She did not go into any detail about how those computerized reading programs were structured, which I would like to find out more about it. If these computerized reading program are as interesting as the traditional independent reading Routman has highly recommended, I can see it working well with adult readers. In our reading program, we have  one hour per week required lab time which could be used for the computerized reading-incentive program. This is something I would like to look into.

My Book Blog 2: Integration

One of the framing questions for LLSS538 is: how do people become literate? Since I started my book, I have been intentionally searching for the exact text that provides an answer to this framing questions. Only until know did I realize that this whole book was answering this question: students become literate by learning to read and write, and students become readers and writers by processing massive amounts of text. It appears that Routman's definition of literacy is limited to mostly reading and writing. However, if we read deeper into the text, Routman believes that reading is the route for students to become literate and literacy represents a much bigger picture. She goes on to propose that in order to promote literacy development, skills should not be taught in isolation and that students need to see how the discrete pieces of literacy learning cohere into a communicable whole.

Routman argues that "breaking learning into bits and pieces can actually make things more difficult for students…and focusing excessively on skills in isolation severely limits learning possibilities…" (50). Therefore, basic skills should be integrated into a meaning and challenging context.  

Routman's notion of integrating skills into a meaningful context reminds me of Gee's definition of Discourse, which is an integration of acts: saying, doing, being, valuing and believing. Gee goes on to defines literacy in terms of Discourse (the mastery of a secondary Discourse); so Gee's definition of literacy is also an integration of skills. I am having difficulty to explain this in a clear way, but I really see certain connection here. I think Routman's idea aligns with Gee's theory.

As I was reading this section of my book, I cannot help thinking about our developmental reading program here at Central New Mexico Community College. Our reading curriculum is pretty much isolated and operates on its own, which could be one of the reasons why our student success rate is low. My students come into my reading class to learn all the reading skills, such as finding main ideas and supporting details, making inferences, identifying purpose and tones, analyzing arguments, etc. However, they don't know how to apply these skills outside of my classroom into their overall college study.  Besides, students do not get too excited about our reading courses because they don't see the relevance or meaning of a reading improvement course. Both Routman and Gee hits on the notion of integration one way or another, so it must indicate something important.

The good news is that at our school, we have been making an effort to create a more integrated curriculum. For example, we pair up our reading course with a sociology or psychology course and form a learning community. In the learning community, students can practice their newly-learned reading skills into the study of that content subject. So far, the practice has shown good results. I think it just confirms the importance of an integrated curriculum.

My Book Blog 1: Bonding with Students

The book I chose to read is "Reading Essentials: The Specifics You Need to Teach Reading Well" by Regie Routman. I picked this book because most of its reviews are saying this book is full of practical strategies and immediately doable tips on how to teach reading well to students. I am now 50 pages into the book and I have to agree that this book is really down-to-earth and highly practical. Even though a lot of the content sounds like professional common sense, it still challenges teachers to reflect on their own teaching and inspires them to do better.

            The core question this book attempts to answer is: what does it mean to be an effective teacher of reading? However, Routman does not give us the right or best answer to that question because there is No One" right" or best way.  Throughout the text, she gives her informed opinion, but it is up to us, the reader, to decide what work for us and our students in our particular school and classroom.  

            In my first 50 pages of reading, a couple of Routman's  ideas stood out. The first idea is bonding with students. We have been told as teachers that we must love each of our students. However, we have all had students who, for whatever reasons, are difficult for us to love. But bonding is quite another matter. Bonding could be as simple as looking at a student in the eye with interest or listening to what a student has to say. Routman argues that if there is no bonding between teachers and students, there will be no learning to occur. Once our students bond with us and trust us, anything is possible. As a community college instructor, I have heard my students talking about how they prefer our classrooms to a large four-year university classroom. A major reason is that at a community college, instructors get to know them individually as a person and it is more likely to establish that personal connection between teacher and student. I feel inspired by Routman's bonding idea because at the college-level teaching, we seem to have overlooked the human and emotional aspect of learning. We only get to meet our students once or twice a week, we assume that our students are all adults and can take care of themselves, and we suppose that as long as we teach them the content subject, we complete our job. Little did I realize how much more effective learning would be if we bond with our adult students.  

            Another good idea that Routman proposes is maintaining a reading record for ourselves. There are multiple benefits to keeping a reading record. It encourages us to read more; it keeps track of our own reading; more importantly, teachers can carry this habit over to students and help students become better readers. Routman emphasizes that we teachers have to be readers if we are to teach reading and writing well. That makes me feel ashamed of myself because I have never been a big reader and I AM a reading teacher now. I want to change and I think keeping a reading record can help me achieve my goal.

This is to continue from my first blog entry. I am still learning how to use my blogs and the site seems confusing. It took me a little while just to figure out where to start writing a new entry. However, I can see the benefits of blogging. It does provide a good way to reflect on life and unlike a traditional diary, it allows interaction with other people. I also found that a lot of college students are using blogs to write about and discuss what they are learning. In that sense, blogs offer a convenient platform for college students to exchange ideas and expand knowledge. As I mentioned in my first blog entry, I am not a big reader or writer. By using blogs, I wish to do more reading and writing.

One issue I have so far is that I do feel like talking to myself while blogging. The feeling of lack of audience is not very encouraging; however, on the other hand, the lack of audience could free me from worrying about what I write and how well I write. Another issue I am thinking about is the length of a blog. I personally think that bloggers should be able to write whatever comes into their mind without concerning about the length of their entry. Sometimes, we do have more to say about a particular topic while other times, we only feel like saying a few words. When it comes to a requirement for a class, then I understand the length requirement to ensure quality of student work.

When I was reading about blogs, it reminds me of the updates people write on their facebook page. To a certain extent, those facebook updates is like a mini-blog because people use the updates to comment on things of interest, to journal about important events in their life, or simply to share their feelings at a given moment. Now, there is a problem with the facebook page updates, which is some people put up too much updates too frequently and it becomes annoying. I don't think blogs have the same problem.

At this point, I have not found my personal favorite blog yet. I do like traveling blogs, especially traveling blogs about China. I would also like to find blogs that are created by and shared among developmental education teachers. It will be very helpful to read about their teaching practices and exchange ideas about developmental education.

Well, I will stop here today. My thoughts are really random and I literally write whatever comes into my head at the moment. I am not sure if this is way blogs are supposed to be.

Obviously, I am quite behind on following up with technology. This is my very first experience with blogging. Even though I am not too thrilled about it, I still feel curious to learn about blogging and see what it has to offer. I am a little apprehensive about it also because I have never been a big reader or writer in my life. I got through my schooling with good grades and I am now an English teacher, however, reading and writing has never been my strength. I definitely want to change that and perhaps blogging will start a new adventure for me, an adventure into reading and writing.